Sand Glass (31 page)

His sudden
change of mood unnerved me nearly as much as the news that we were
going to be turned into little fragments of atoms by tonight if we
hadn’t left.

‘Is it a nuke?’
I asked.

‘Not really a
good idea.’ Jared walked ahead a few paces.

‘So we just
collapse the whole thing to prevent any more action by this
Rimmington and then get out of here?’

‘That’s the
general idea.’ said Janey as we started the strange and
discomforting walk down another tunnel where two realities
flickered in and out of our vision.

A little while
later we were in the tidy corridors that seemed to belong to the
old cell block of Alexander’s people. We walked for about fifteen
minutes and came across the corridor and the cell in which Jules
had first been found.

‘This is our
way out.’ said Jared, ‘If memory serves me correctly. Going back
the other way, we end up out of the mountain in the ice fields not
far from the location of the path to the train I think.'

‘Could we get
the train?’ asked Janey.

‘Maybe, is
there time?’ Jared asked Oliver.

‘Yes. We could
do that. The further we get from here the more time we will in fact
have.’

‘What?’ I said.
It really was not making sense.

‘Someone punch
him out!’ Oliver growled.

‘Yes. Indeed.’
Jared was calm.

We continued
along the route we had chosen. The others didn’t seem disturbed by
the kaleidoscope of changing realities that flicked around us.

‘Did you…?’ I
said. Jared and Oliver urged haste. We rounded a corner. The men
pulled up suddenly. Janey stood and frowned in a way that was
almost disinterested disapproval. I came up from the back and was
just about to ask yet another question to distract my mind, when I
stopped and realised what was waiting for us; ‘Oh!’ I said, hardly
Shakespeare, but that’s the way it goes: as we were faced with the
awesome sight of a lot of Rimmington’s men regarding us with at
first a curious disgust; and then as recognition took hold a
bloodthirsty determination to annihilate us. We turned and ran.

It is almost
impossible to explain the feeling of sheer mind numbing terror that
was the rabbit running from the hunter. I was not thinking, I was
not feeling anything except the screaming of my muscles as we
sprinted down a long corridor and turned corners. It was only to
find the tide of these grey men looming in the distance. We turned
yet another corner and saw a long, straight, dimly lit place with a
door way at the end.

‘Is it open?’
Jared yelled. Oliver accelerated ahead of us intent I supposed on
ramming open; it if it was held with a lock of any kind. There were
cries behind us and I felt the rush of air moving in this place.
Would it hurt? I wondered if it did. Being shot. It seemed like an
unglamorous death. Not compared to being eaten by something Piscean
and huge. My only thought was: If I survive: I will go fishing with
Alex next year.

We charged at
break neck speed and flung ourselves through those double lab type
doors. They gave way easily. We ran forward several yards before
slowing. We stopped and looked at each other for a moment; suddenly
at high pitched brittle screaming sound triangled on our auditory
nerves with a killing precision. Everyone was doubling over in pain
as we were flung into a brain shattering sound. It was like
breaking glass, but a lot louder. Even shouting could not have
overcome it. Everyone jammed their hands in their ears. I saw
Oliver on his knees and Jared curling in a tight ball, Janey was
somewhere to my right. I could feel it in my breast bone, and my
gut too.

As suddenly as
it had begun it ceased. Lights came on overhead. We were in a wide
space full of large rounded objects. They looked a bit like black
toffee mounds or giant shiny pebbles. They stood about thirty or
forty feet apart from each other, and there seemed to be no pattern
to the spacing. They were perhaps more like big blobs of glass that
had set solid. I thought that they emanated a strange low resonance
when you go near to them.

‘Is everyone
alright?’ asked Jared, as we took our fingers out of our ears.

The three of us
nodded.

‘What is this
place?’ I whispered, sending a ricochet of echoes that carried on
into the distance. The place was huge. We had just arrived out of a
small tunnel into a vast space. Lights blazed way overhead,
crashing all sense of distance and perspective. It numbed the mind
and shrank us down into tiny little creatures on a giants dinner
table. We were only a few yards from the tunnel. But this, as we
turned round and round in open-mouthed awe, staggered the mind and
swamped the vision.

Then we heard
boots. Many boots. There was nowhere to run; nowhere to hide. The
lights erased all shadows and eliminated all possibility of
escape.

‘This,’ said a
voice full of pride, ‘is what it has always been about.’

If you can say
something without actually saying it, then Jared and Janey were
doing that. They both were radiating the most fearful sense of
threat that any person had it within them to project. It was like a
fire, you could feel the radiant heat arc across the gaps between
objects. Like that moment when you think that something couldn’t
possibly be true, and then discover that actually it is.

He came towards
us. That Man. That one man who looked so much like Jules. And yet
it was the shape of the face that bore the similarity. His eyes
were not like a cat. They were, how shall I say it?… bland in the
extreme. Mild and inoffensive, and yet….. they were crawling with
some evil that I could not describe, but made me breathe in
sharply. I thought of Heelio’s warning about the things that are
within; about demons inside. And I truly believed it then, for the
first time in my life. I had seen its eyes and I was sure that
things like that were real.

‘Now we have
you all.’ He said. His voice was not like before. Perhaps it was
this place with its sibilant echoes. And it’s vast space that made
you feel like you were exposed on the surface of the moon. But the
quality of it had something else there….a grating metallic rasp
that was almost mechanical. Yet it lived and breathed. The others
arrived. Many others, stepping from behind the boulders, or
whatever they were.

‘Welcome to the
party.’ said one.

‘Today we show
you the New World.’ said another.

‘’It is better
to comply now.’ said the next.

‘We expect you
to cooperate.’ He stepped nearer to us.

The same man….
Different clothes. Or variations of the same clothes. Again and
again…. The man called Alexander advanced upon us until we turned
round and round and drew closer to each other, and were dizzy with
the horror of it.

There was a
silence. An impasse. He stood…. They stood. It seemed they were
waiting for us to speak or react or do something. The light
overhead blazed down on this thing that I now saw as the end result
of the project they had renamed “Nimbus”. This was quite unlike
being watched by the tribes people. This was creepy in the extreme.
They didn’t do anything. They just stood there waiting, until I
supposed, one of us broke the silence.

I could hear us
breathing. A living, desperately vivid thing in this graveyard
stillness. Jared slipped his hand into mine, I could feel him
shaking….was it fear or anger, or some intense heartfelt passion
that was about to burst out. I kept hold, thinking I wanted to
protect him, Janey joined hands on the left of me, Oliver stood
behind me, put his hand on my left shoulder. I felt just a tiny bit
better. There were after all four of us. And whatever he now was,
the ingredients had been extracted were out of one person’s psyche
only. I felt that we had the edge with intelligent thought, if not
in actual numerical superiority.

There was
movement. Another one of them came forward. He looked older than
the others. They moved aside to let him through. He strode towards
us, a packet of those black cigarillos in one hand that was large
and had a gold ring on the middle finger.

‘Ah! So I see
you again!’ he appeared to be addressed Jared. But I wasn’t sure.
‘Let us discuss this like gentlemen…’ he offered the packet to
Jared. I saw Jared bite his lip, I felt him tense as if ready to
spring. I tugged at his hand. He squeezed it harder once. I saw his
eyes flickered towards me, then back to this clever enemy.

‘I know you
like them,’ said this particular Mr Alexander, ‘I know all your
vices. And your tastes in food, clothes, cars and women.’

I wasn’t sure,
but I saw a tiny movement of his eyes towards Janey then.

When Jared made
no response, ‘I can give her back to you. Of course I can! But
where would be the fun in that? She is feisty… perhaps fiery one
might say! For such a woman, perhaps you might be induced to comply
with one simple request of mine?’

I felt Jared
stiffen with anger, or perhaps with determination. He squeezed my
hand again rather sharply and let go. He stepped forward. Oliver
took his place next to me.

‘Show me the
woman you speak of.’ said Jared.

‘Ooooh! Clever
you! Didn’t fall for that trick. Just a moment then.’

From our right
another two of the men came through the thick crowd. There was a
woman I did not recognise. But Jared clearly did.

Janey shook her
head, ‘The hair.’ She said. Jared shook his head slightly.

‘No?’ said
Alexander, ‘What a shame. She took ages to dress up. Such a
waste!’

One of the two
holding her, produced a knife and slashed it across her neck. She
immediately crumpled into a greenish powder that stained the floor
then crackled like acid on something metallic; and then vanished
completely.

Janey squeezed
my hand very hard. I knew clearly what she meant: Don’t talk.

‘What about
this one?’ he said.

‘Or this one?’
said another man walking forward.

‘Or this
one?’

Jared backed
off, until he bumped into me.

They came
forward. Two of the men at a time each with a young woman held
firmly between them. Marcia. I heard that sound that Jared
sometimes made in his throat, something like a growl of anger, or
gulp of anguish. We all put our hands on his shoulders and arms
protectively.

‘This is
nonsense,’ said Janey.

‘Choose.’ said
the man, ‘and then you can go.’

‘What is your
request?’ said Jared stiffly.

‘My request?
That is simple. All you have to do is resign.’

‘Resign?’ Jared
sounded surprized, ‘from what?’

‘He’s
bluffing.’ said Oliver.

‘No. he’s not.
Whoever he is.’ Jared said, ‘Oliver. Ready the points.’

Oliver took his
pack off and immediately took out a strange mini crossbow and a
leather pack which he fastened round his waist.

Janey nudged
me. She already had her hunting knife out. I got my knife out of
the sheath too.

‘Right hand,
Milnes. To your left. Got it?’ Oliver loaded the crossbow with one
of those sharpened sticks. I nodded. My mouth had gone dry.

Jared held up
his right hand just in front of Oliver. Scout salute? Three
fingers, little fingers and thumb bent down.

I wasn’t sure,
but I saw the main man look slightly taken aback.

‘This is not
what I expected of you Mr Arden! How come you are being so unkind
to your mistress here? Isn’t it about time you admitted that you
like to play around a bit?’ he looked surprized then. A red dot
appeared on the chest. He keeled over. The bolt from Oliver’s bow.
He fired three more in quick succession. We had already started to
move. All these Alexander men’s faces contorted like plasticene as
one of their number was destroyed; they snapped into shape again
and ran towards us. I didn’t have time to think. Oliver had killed
two of the “Marcia” women. The other was running to Jared. He
dropped to the floor, and kicked her hard in the shins. She toppled
over him, and quickly turned round. He brought the knife down with
both hands into the chest. I saw a red spurt and then a green
acidic mess. Jared jumped backwards, a look of pure rage on his
face.

‘Look out!’
screamed Janey.

I ducked and
then slashed across the wrist of the man on top of me. He dissolved
into nothingness. Grey dust, just like the soldiers. I was moving
dodging in and out of the seething mass. I forgot the rule and
stabbed at any bit of them I could see before they got me. I didn’t
notice it at first. But we were slowly being herded further away
from the place where we had come in. They just kept coming. Some
were like acid green stuff. Others just dust. One came at me
snarling like some nightmare. With a thunk, a bolt from Oliver’s
crossbow toppled him. We were up against one of those stone things.
I didn’t know why, but I thought this was bad. The thing was glassy
and strangely attractive. I thought we’d better make a run for
it.

‘Come!’ said
Jared, ‘Now!’ we turned and ran back towards the wall. They seemed
to be dropping behind us. We were still felling the few that had
followed us with slashes of our hunting knives. I desperately
wanted to get hold of a cross bow like Oliver’s.

We were still
running. And the wall didn’t seem any nearer.

‘Stop!’ yelled
Janey. We skidded into a tight knot, breath tearing at our throats.
Everyone spun round expecting another onslaught, but they were
backing off away from us.

‘What the
hell?’ Oliver pointed at the wall, with the cross bow.

There was a
door. Old fashioned. Wooden. Whichever way we tried to go the wall
receded away from us. Unless we went towards this door.

We reached it.
It was ajar.